You see, this was one of the most unbelievably long and drawn out cases in Valley history. Filed in 1997, Xerox was alleging that a company predating the existence of Palm had stolen its Graffiti handwriting recognition technology.

Nine years later, having spent untold millions in legal fees, Xerox settles. That should be a lesson to all the folks throwing around patent cases these days.

Perhaps the best part of the agreement was that both sides agreed not to sue each other for seven years.

SUPERFAST JAVA: A coffesshop in Cornwall, England is offering a stupendously fast Internet connection, up to 50 times faster than your average broadband.

BBC

Goonhilly sports 61 satellites and a rockin’ Net connection

For those of you scoring at home, users can download up to 100 megabits per second at the geekiest coffee shop in Her Majesty’s service.

According to the BBC’s account of the place, the fastest coffeeshop in the world is tapped directly into British Telecom’s global Internet protocol network due to its proximity to the Goonhilly satellite station.

BT’s Adrian Hosford told the BBC:

It would be possible to use the cafe’s computers to download in less than 15 minutes a file the equivalent size of the DVD version of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, with its 19,000 illustrations, 629 audio and video clips and 100,000 articles.

MICROSOFT 360: Lost amid the smoke and mirrors during Microsoft’s Unified Communications launch Monday was a pretty neat new camera.

TG Daily/Microsoft

A prototype of Microsoft’s Roundtable 360 camera

TG Daily is reporting on Microsoft’s Roundtable 360 videoconferencing phone. Although it’s still in development, the finished product would allegedly sit in the middle of your conference room and rotate around as different people “took the floor” during discussion. As its name suggests, it would offer a 360 degree perspective on the room.

TG says the demo was neat but people could start getting dizzy during heated exchanges, as the camera buzzes back and forth.

As usual, let’s wait and see if Microsoft can deliver on its promise.

That’s all for now folks. Please tell us what you see going on in the vast world of technology.